Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Party officials with newspaper columns

The New Democratic Party met in convention this weekend. What happened and what did it mean?

There are glowing lines about the rapturous welcome given to the 103 NDP MPs, the most successful leader in NDP history, the gift of youth "long into this century" for the party, etc. All very understated stuff. What goes unmentioned, however, is that Topp was elected President of the party. No bio upgrade there on the right either.

Elsewhere, Topp writes this on the "socialist" in the preamble problem (without mentioning the word socialist): "But they voted, near-unanimously, to refer the matter back to the party's officers for more work." The party's officers? I think the word he's looking for there is "me."

I think about how I would react if the Conservative party president had a regular platform in the Globe or another national media outlet. Not well. And it's no different for the NDP party president.